Mamta's Kitchen - A Family Cookbook
Leon's restaurant
I'm going to Leon's on Thursday for lunch with a friend and we'r both going to try Mamta's chicken curry. I'll come back and let you know our thoughts.
Just had a look at their ingredients: cooked rice (Spanish easy cook rice, olive oil, tamari (wheat free soy sauce), lemon juice, salt), diced red pepper, gherkins (gherkins, water, spirit vinegar, glucose-fructose syrup, salt, sugar, natural flavours), extra virgin olive oil, grilled chicken (marinated in extra virgin olive oil, lemon juice & garlic with water and pea starch), indian curry sauce (Chilli powder, smoked paprika, poppy seeds, salt, sunflower oil, tomatoes, turmeric, water, garam masala, cumin seeds, curry leaves, tamarind and date chutney (sugar, vinegar, sultana, tamarind, apple, water, salt, mustard seeds, spice, garlic, ginger) cardamon, organic swiss boullion (sea salt, yeast extract, rice flour, palm oil, onion, celery, carrot, parsley, turmeric), mustard seeds, creamed coconut, garlic, ginger, onion), leon raita (Greek yoghurt, cucumber, mint).
Slightly different from my version on Mamta's curry :-}
I think it looks over inflated due to them having to show everyhing...
on here we would say add a stock cube, where they have to list the contents of the stock cube (veg etc, stabilizers, salt, yeast extract etc )
Steve
Incidentally, does anyone know of an Indian spice that can leave your mouth dry? I don't add much salt to anything I make and I never eat the entire contents of the pan in one sitting, but sometimes after eating Indian food I find myself with a dry mouth.
Sid
Dry or numb ?.. clove will numb your mouth..could it be that affect ?
Steve
Nope, not cloves - I have chewed on cloves and I know what effect they have - a dry mouth like you would have if you eat way too much salt...except I don't use that much salt in my food anymore. I'm just curious to know if it is an Indian spice that can have that effect, because it only occurs when I have eaten Indian food. Not all of the time, but sometimes.
Totally unrelated, but I remember in Spain a few years ago I had enchiladas at a restaurant, and I don't know what was in them but I had to order a 2 litre bottle of water with my meal and I drank it within 10 minutes. After leaving the restaurant I felt extremely hot and no matter what I did I couldn't cool down. The heat doesn't bother me at all, but that evening I felt ill for about an hour after the meal. Went back to the same restaurant a few days later with a mate and we both had the same thing again, and the same thing happened to me and also to him. I have no idea what was in them, but they weren't salty...needless to say I never went back there again.
Sid
Interesting observation Seabird, I had not looked at the ingredients list. However, looking closely, the list is not that long if you separate ingredients into everything else that is on your plate along with the curry. Ingredients up to the chicken on the list belong to rice and relish, not the curry. Then there are Raita ingredients at the end of it.
This is the curry sauce they used; Curry Sauce . They tasted 3 I had prepared for them and selected this one.
I have listed following ingredients on the recipe itself, it is not a short list;
?2 medium onions (250-300 gm.), peeled and roughly chopped
?2-3-4 cloves garlic, peeled
?1/2-1 inch piece of ginger, peeled and roughly chopped
For tempering
?3-4 tbsp. oil ?1 level tsp. black mustard seeds (rai)
?A small handful of curry leave (not bay leaves) ?2 dry red chillies, broken up into halves ?
For Curry paste
?1 level tsp. turmeric powder
?2 tsp. coriander powder
?1 tsp. cumin powder
?1 level tsp. chilli powder, adjust to taste
?1 full tsp. sweet paprika powder (for colour)
?1 1/2-2 level tsp. salt, adjust to taste. It is better to start with less and add more if necessary
?1 cup thick yoghurt (skimmed yoghurt often curdles during cooking)
?2 level tbsp. whole grain made mustard like Coleman?s or made mustard from a jar.
For Making the Sauce
?1 cup water (adjust as needed). Amount also depends on whether your main ingredient is going to ?let out? water thus making the gravy thinner.
?2-3 tbsp. cream coconut powder (sold in packets). You can use tinned creamed coconut. The amount is a rough guide only, check and adjusts it to your taste.
?1 tsp. Garam Masala
?A handful or coriander leaves, chopped finely (optional)
The only other additions I see are Date chutney and Swiss bouillon. The chef who came to my house to taste, select and look at the way I cook the curry, is Leon?s head chef, a master of his profession. I am quite happy for him to have made minor adjustments, I have no idea how one mass produces any dish! LOL!
Phil is right, they have to break down ingredients of everything, including a stock cube.
Lapis, I have to say that their curry is very close to mine in taste and is like an Indian curry.
Sid, do you put a lot of chillies? Chilli makes your mouth salivate a lot while eating, leaving it dry perhaps! I am not sure about this scientifically, just a thought!
Just got back from lunch at Leon's.
I have never seen a Leon's before so I was surprised that it is more cafe style than a restaurant with approx 50% of custom being take away (while we were there).
All food eaten in is supplied at the counter in cardboard boxes with throwaway plastic cutlery.
A previous poster was correct in saying that this was a curry rather than an Indian curry. I have only made Mamta's basic curry sauce recipe 1 and we're totally hooked on that - I didn't realse that there were more recipes so I was sitting there comparing Mamta's recipe 1 to Leons - doh!
Summary: The overwhelming smell of lunch was of gherkins. I didn't like it but my friend did but we both put it at the bottom of the list of places where we have lunched (we're doing a City curry lunch tour! - top of the list so far is Shad Indian restaurant in Tooley Street). Price ?5.75 which is cheap for the City but thats offset by approx ?2.25 - ?2.50 for a normal size bottle of coke/water. I'm not saying it was horrible - just that I prefer Indian curries.
My mission for the future? try Mamta's recipe 3 at home.
"The overwhelming smell of lunch was of gherkins."
This can be a problem with some individual servers/waiters, they put too much of the side dishes. There was too much raita served drowning the curry taste, when someone else ate at Brent-cross branch. I had the squash & peas version and thought that the curry sauce was quite nice.
For another time, try Dishoom near Leicester Square, an old Iranian/Bombay Coffee style restaurant (there are many Irani (Parsees) satteled in Bombay area). Kavita took me there yesterday. We had already met a few people for lunch from another board, so couldn't eat, but has 'Chai' and mince pies with chillies and rum in them. The d?cor was somewhat like an old Indian tea shop, ceiling fans going slowly, with food being cooked in front of you and lovely smells of fresh food wafting.
Sid, do you put a lot of chillies? Chilli makes your mouth salivate a lot while eating, leaving it dry perhaps! I am not sure about this scientifically, just a thought!
No, not really. I can eat very hot food but I rarely make my food very hot.
Sid, the curry was based on mum's basic curry sauce and the 3 or 4 times I've had it now, it's tasted really very close to mum's own... I was surprised how close they got it, actually.
Sorry you didn't enjoy the overall experience though!
Kavey
Sid, the curry was based on mum's basic curry sauce and the 3 or 4 times I've had it now, it's tasted really very close to mum's own... I was surprised how close they got it, actually.
Sorry you didn't enjoy the overall experience though!
Kavey
I think you mean seabird, Kav... I just asked a question slightly off topic to what the original post was about - I'm good at hijacking forum threads so I am told LOL!!
I haven't been to a Leon's nor have I tried the curry sauce. I wasn't referring to the curry sauce, I just asked a question about something else. Maybe you should delete what I have written just in case someone gets the wrong impression about the curry sauce. I can always start a new thread. My apologies.
Sid